No Pride in Deportation: From Vice to ICE Toolkit
BreakOUT!
and NOWCRJ’s Congress of Day Laborers recently released the Vice to ICE Toolkit, a resource on organizing across intersections of identities, including race, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, country of origin, and language.
Developed through a partnership between BreakOUT! and the Congress of Day Laborers, Vice to ICE is the name the organizations use for their work that recognizes the intersections between struggles for liberation, as well as intentional building with those whose lives are at the intersections of these identities – LGBTQ undocumented communities in New Orleans.
“Now, more than ever, as LGBTQ communities celebrate Pride all over the country against the backdrop of continued mass deportation and incarceration of LGBTQ undocumented youth of color, we need bold strategies for building deep, meaningful relationships across language and across and within all of our communities, focused on winning liberation in the South,” said BreakOUT! Youth Organizer and Congreso member, Arely Westley.
“We have to be willing to think about what safety for all of our communities really means. As we organize against the City of New Orleans’s proposed $40 million security plan that will only serve to lock up and surveil all of our communities, it is more important than ever to link the fight for sanctuary with the fight for safety for all of our communities. And to truly win these battles, it will take all of us pushing together.”
The Toolkit, described as “a labor of love,” includes contributions from Southerners on New Ground and the Southeast Immigrant Rights Network, while drawing inspiration from years of organizing in New Orleans. It provides conversation starters groups can use to break down language barriers, workshop curriculum for political education that can be used with different immigrant and/or LGBTQ bases, and testimonies from LGBTQ immigrant youth.
